fast and curious

November 2015

Totally stuffed from eating turkey, stuffing, and a slice of pumpkin pie larger than his head, Matt knew it was time to go holiday shopping. Dreading every moment of it, he headed to the mall and started crossing things off his list. The first six gifts he bought cost this much:

$2

$3

$6

$11

$21

$51

"Wow!" he thought. "That's a really interesting pattern. I only need to buy one more gift, and I know exactly how much I'm going to spend."

Let's celebrate! I recently climbed out of the cellar of the Curious fantasy football league (I know you care), so we're celebrating by taking on a football-themed brainteaser. Get your pads on and tackle this one.

A Word Ladder is a puzzle where you start with a real word, then change one letter at a time to make new real words, to eventually end at a target word. For instance, you can change CAT to PIG like this:

This course from Teresa Funke, award-winning author and writer’s coach, guides you through the steps to writing your first novel. Get proven tips on outlines, characters, plots, and how to make revisions. You'll even learn how to get your book to publishers.

Are you ready for some football? I hope so, because football barrels toward you if you're ready or not. Whether you think of football as a brilliant chess match played out with athletic grace or a 'roid-filled concussion fiesta, I know you can figure this out. Give it a shot:

In this football league, there are 6 teams that play each other once (i.e., round robin). Looking at just the first 5 teams, they have 1, 2, 3, 3, and 5 wins in some order, and they have 0, 2, 2, 3, and 3 losses in some order.